case study

The Boeing Company

737 Programs and Renton Wash. site

Jim Anderson, photographer, courtesy of The Boeing Company.

“It started out as an idea about a facilities change.

It quickly turned into an opportunity for all of our
people to work together to continuously improve
and trust one another to get the work done.”
Carolyn Corvi, Vice President - General Manager,
Airplane Production, Boeing.
Measures revealed
a newfound
“connectedness”
between employees
and the aircraft,
earlier and better
problem solving,
a higher sense of
urgency to improve,
and a greater
satisfaction when
planes go out
the door.
 Boeing: shaking things up.

p
Situation Earthquakes aren’t generally good for business. Producivity

50%
But for Carolyn Corvi, Vice President - General Manager, Airplane Production at Boeing,
one earthquake in particular helped instigate a major cultural and physical change for
its Boeing 737 manufacturing site in Renton, Washington. This potential tragedy resulted
in a dramatic change to the face and working model of Boeing’s 737 operations that
included production gains of 50%, a space reduction of 40%, and a cultural shift to
on-site teamwork and persistent communication.

q
The journey began in 2000. The ubiquitous 737 is Boeing’s most successful aircraft and
commands 40% of the world’s commercial jet sales.

Despite - or perhaps because of - its market leadership, Boeing was facing fierce
Space Reduction
competition amidst the added effects of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on air travel and the

40%
race to incorporate lean manufacturing into its processes.

More efficient manufacturing processes and new ways of working were essential for
future success. Corvi was searching for a way to break away from the traditional,
regimented Boeing culture that
kept engineers and office workers
separated from the mechanics
and manufacturing employees
who build the planes. The
question was how to implement
a major culture change and
revolutionize the aircraft
production process.
The new Boeing
Surprisingly, help came in the leadership community
form of Mother Nature. A 6.8
connects executives
with activity on the
magnitude earthquake hit

assembly line.
Renton and almost flattened the
building housing 1,400 Boeing
737 engineers. Corvi seized the opportunity to make an economic case for not just
relocating employees but to initiate a whole new way of working within her organization.

“There was always a huge gap between the people who design the product and those
who build it on the factory floor,” recalls Corvi. The plant was a “no-go zone” for some
engineers proud of their hard-earned white-collar stature.

“Everyone’s got to be focused on the airplane,” she says, “and you can’t be focused on
the airplane if you’re in an office a quarter of a mile away.”

So she decided to move the engineers into vacant warehouse space in the 737 plant on
the shore of Lake Washington, an idea dubbed “Move to the Lake.”

3
Corvi pledged to Boeing executives that the new model would meet specific productivity
and efficiency targets. “But the real point,” she says, “was to get people working
together in a different way.”

For help, Boeing engaged the Steelcase consulting team, including its Seattle area
furniture dealer, BarclayDean, and the architectural design firm of NBBJ, experts in
merging manufacturing and office environments.

Ask, Observe, Experience

The “Move to the Lake” began at a three-day kick-off workshop. Steelcase assembled
a team of 35 Boeing executives, managers and engineers. The group was equipped
with still cameras and video recorders, and they fanned out into their office areas.
They set out to record things they were forced to “workaround,” furniture that didn’t

The real point was to get people working together

support their needs, patterns of work and problems with heat, cold and lighting.

in a different way.
“As part of the process, we take hundreds of photos and video clips,” says Steelcase
Consultant R.T. Yates, “and sort them into patterns to understand what all this data is
telling us.”

It’s all part of an exclusive Steelcase “workplace effectiveness” methodology that taps
into the knowledge and creativity of the people who actually use the workplace. Described
as “ask, observe and experience,” the Steelcase process asks questions through its
proprietary Workplace Boeing employees
Surveys. The process engage in co-design
also includes interviews, activities that help
observations through
to identify and under-
stand organizational
first-hand anthropological

work process.
techniques, and gives
people the experience
of thinking through the
physical requirements
of their workplace
and modeling their
ideal spaces.

Those who attended

the workshop credit it
with much of the later
success of the project.
“It would have taken
on a whole different character if they hadn’t pulled us into the process as they did,”
says Pat Manelly, the factory superintendent and liaison between engineers and
mechanics at the time of the move.

4
 To test the ideas generated from the workshop, Boeing moved a 35-person engineering
team into an open-air mezzanine in the plant for 90 days.

Many of the engineers didn’t look forward to working in the factory, according to
Kendall Krieg, a manager in the group. But they liked the new style of work. Working
closely with the shop-floor mechanics allowed them to solve problems as soon as
they arose and made for a better product.

“The biggest change was that it gave people an opportunity to know they didn’t need
to do things the same way any more,” says Krieg. “We began mapping processes
better because everyone began thinking about how their work flowed to and from
others. It broke down the barriers.”

By the end of the pilot, the Boeing workers solve

engineers didn’t want to leave problems quickly while
their space. Lynda Carlson, staying close to the
engineering leader for the “Move plant floor.
to the Lake,” says the pilot project
marked a turning point. “There
was a 180-degree difference in
attitude from the beginning of the
pilot to the end,” she says.

The “Move to the Lake.”

Solution Through the summer and fall of 2004, the “Move to the Lake” brought 2500 employees -
including engineers and the eight-member executive team - into the newly completed
workspace, closer to the products and people they support.

Led by design principal Anne Cunningham and project manager Lori Walker, the NBBJ
design team created the final space design based on a lean manufacturing process.
It incorporated a “parts-to-whole” On the plant floor
theme, which represented the employees track
manufacturing process of taking progress as they
move down the line
many individual parts at the beginning

with the airplane.

of the production line, assembling
them and testing the finished
aircraft before it emerges at the
end of the plant. This theme was
reinforced with everything from
artwork that featured various
airplane parts to the pervasive visual
connection to the production line
through a special lighting system that signaled problem areas, as well as the product’s
progression through various manufacturing stages.

5
Today, Boeing veterans hardly recognize the 60-year-old plant - birthplace of the first
commercial jetliner, the 707. More mind-boggling still is the new Boeing culture that
has taken root inside.

Engineers now work in mezzanine-level, open-plan spaces alongside a transparent

polycarbonate wall that stretches the length of the vast plant. Through it, engineers
view the entire panorama of the massive, moving production line. The visual connection
between people and planes is stunning and persistent - and the impact is dramatic.

This wide boardwalk is

a frequent meeting point
for discussions among
executives, mechanics,
engineers, and others.

A wide boardwalk - formerly a staging area for aircraft parts - extends outside the
offices and opens to the factory environment. It’s a frequent meeting point for discussions
among executives, engineers, mechanics and others, and adds to the distinctly demo-
cratic feel of a workplace where the line between office and plant, blue collar and
white collar, is blurring.

On the production floor - where it now takes 11 days,

not 22, to make a 737 - is the revolution.
And employees move freely in and out of the new common areas - communal “knowledge
cafes” with projectors and screens, mini-libraries and soft seating. In the employee
services center, mechanics and engineers alike visit their credit union, use Internet
connections, drop off dry cleaning or get photo film developed. At the north end,
above the catered cafeteria, employees and executives eat before a glass-fronted vista
of Lake Washington.

But on the production floor - where it now takes 11 days, not 22, to make a 737 - is
the revolution. Light streams in through windows carved into the 10-city-block facility,
a highly controversial move - distracting and dangerous, said the naysayers - which
eventually came to define the liberation of corporate culture. Engineers who once
never set foot inside the factory now see what’s happening. After all, it’s right before
their eyes.

6
 Where a problem encountered by a mechanic once took days or weeks to solve, it’s
now often solved within the hour. A system of green, yellow and purple lights visually
displays the status of production on the line and helps communicate when urgent
issues require attention. Engineers come down from the mezzanine to offer help.
Huddles form around a bottleneck. There are even cases of engineers anticipating
issues and arriving before a problem arises.

“You’re working right next to the airplane you helped design,” says Manelly. “When you
see them move down the line inch by inch towards the back door, you know you’ve got
to move, too.”

“Before this project, Boeing didn’t see the physical workspace as something they could
use to leverage for work performance, culture, behavior or attracting and retaining
young college graduates,” notes Steelcase Workplace Consultant John Naismith.
“This traditional-thinking company was able to prove to itself that physical space can
bring about new behavior and better results.”

Breaking down barriers.

Results Many changes underlie that 50% productivity bonanza, including the adoption of a lean
manufacturing culture. And “Move to the Lake” played a crucial role.

The immediate-term measures revealed a newfound “connectedness” between

employees and the aircraft, earlier and better problem solving, a higher sense of urgency
to improve, and greater satisfaction when planes go out the door.

The “Move to the Lake” reduced space occupancy by 40% and made engineers partners,

Conveniently located
side by side, in the production

meeting spaces allow for

process. “Using space and existing

impromptu discussions
assets more efficiently,” notes
Naismith, “is significant in helping
break down blue-collar and white- while staying focused on
collar barriers that previously stood in the airplane.
the way of real collaboration. In that
sense, it allowed Boeing to make
superior use of intellectual assets,
too.”

It’s a lesson that many manufacturers

may consider. “Just-in-time and
sub-assembly outsourcing creates a
lot of excess manufacturing space,”
Naismith notes. “It presents an
opportunity to evaluate space
differently and consider ways to bring organizations closer to the products they make.”

“We’re at the beginning of a journey,” adds engineering leader Carlson. “A lot happens
in smaller, more interactive settings.”
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Planned medium and long-term measures - such as engineering responsiveness to
shop floor issues, employee satisfaction, and individual and team productivity - will go
even further in getting a firm grasp of what the “Move to the Lake” really accomplished.

Creating velocity.
With the “Move to the Lake” completed, Boeing now focuses on sustaining and building
on its success. Corvi calls this next phase “Living at the Lake.” “It’s the process,”
she says, “of establishing the norms and behaviors to make sure the gains don’t slip.”

Part of those criteria is for people and space to remain flexible. Teams and people need to
move wherever necessary, and look for opportunities to improve communications, quality
and productivity.

Boeing executives
watch as aircraft leave
the building in 12, not
24 days.

“We’ve got to keep changing,” Corvi says. “We said going in that this was going to be the
great experiment. It has been hard and it’s been a lot of change for a lot of people. But I
know that no one would go back to the way it was.”

Boeing leadership, through Carolyn Corvi and her team, recognized the opportunity to
make the “Move to the Lake” a milestone in using their physical space to enhance their
productivity and effectiveness in building new generations of aircraft.

“It started out as an idea about a facilities change,” Corvi recalls. “It quickly turned into an
opportunity for all of our people to work together to continuously improve and trust one
another to get the work done. We have places to concentrate and public spaces for people
to come together and collaborate.

“This is really about engagement,” Corvi says. “It’s about the power of creating velocity in
the ways we’re working together.”

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 Item #05-0002419 10/05 ©2005 Steelcase Inc. All rights reserved. All specifications subject to change without notice. Trademarks used herein are the property of Steelcase Development Corporation or of their respective owners.
Product directory Services Credits
Steelcase Steelcase Services The Boeing Company
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Pathways® Technology Wall BarclayDean Installation and Asset Management P.O. Box 3707
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